Former Burger King Still Used BK Sign, Menus, Uniforms After It Stopped Being A Burger King

Fast food lovers in one Pittsburgh neighborhood have been confused about the eatery that had a Burger King sign outside and whose employees were wearing Burger King uniforms, but which was definitely not serving Burger King food.

“The food was in a brown paper bag. The fries were in a Dixie cup,” one befuddled customer told WPXI-TV’s Timkya Artist about the apparently faux BK that had been serving noticeably non-Burger King items for about a week.

When the WPXI cameras attempted to film inside and ask management about what was going on, they were ejected from the property.

Eventually an assistant manager explained that the restaurant was in transition to a non-BK establishment, and that if people looked at their receipts they would see they no longer referenced Burger King, but the new eatery’s name.

Still doesn’t explain why the signage and menu boards were all still Burger King-branded, unless BK has suddenly decided to let just anyone sell “Whopper” hamburgers.

Within hours of WPXI’s initial inquiry, the Burger King sign had been taken down, though the negative space left behind still reads “Burger King” to passersby:

The same restaurant sign as it appeared Thursday afternoon.

When WPXI called the city’s health officials, they were informed that the restaurant would be closing its doors temporarily as it can not continue to operate without changing the name of the business in the city’s files.

UPDATE: A rep for Burger King provided Consumerist with the following statement:

Burger King restaurants are dedicated to providing high-quality food, made fresh-to-order for millions of guests every day. We recently experienced a dispute with the former franchisee, who independently-owned and operated this restaurant. We’re working to place a new franchisee in this location very soon.

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Yep. And this whole fiasco started because a bunch of us on the Pittsburgh /r/ were questioning it as well. I find it amazingly interesting how they thought no one would notice if they kept running, when it was obviously against the city laws to not keep running if they had not changed their name. I’d love to know who owns it now and what kind of business scheme/system they’ve worked with, that they think it’s okay to piggyback off a name they no longer franchise.

The thing that gets me (I have friends that work on the SS/near this “Burger King”) is that the food was still made to -look- like it was BK. The menus were the same, etc. I’m surprised they haven’t had a lawsuit slapped on them yet.